VIP Emerald Benefit Review

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After a bumpy start and over 5 months of hype, the Emerald benefits of the VIP Membership Program have arrived [1], [2]. Once a subscriber has paid for their 25th consecutive month they will kick in. Below is a review of the benefits within this tier. Thanks to Kent Nielsen for the popup image.

The breakdown of the benefits is shown on the front page under the VIP tab in the Marketplace. For a review of the other tiers, use the links below.

Bronze|Silver|Gold|Ruby|Titanium

First up is the addition of +5000 Mafia Attack and +5000 Mafia Defense, +250 Attack Skill and +250 Defense Skill added to your character. Zynga states it’s +16,500 and +900 but this is the combined total from all benefit tiers. You will see the increase in your equipment scores on the fight page but it’s combined with Family Progression and Property bonuses. The attack and defense skill addition will also be on the Fight page as well as the Profile page. All additions are in yellow. We often refer to these rented points because if you drop the VIP Membership Program you will lose them.


Getting 1 free Harbinger of Retribution is good but the ‘ability’ to purchase 4 more for $109.00 is hardly a benefit, it’s more of an indication of ones means or regard of their entertainment budget. If Zynga was truly giving me the benefit of the ability to purchase 4 more of these items then they would first mail me a check for $436.00 and state that it was only redeemable for Harbingers of Retributions! With this edition, Zynga had to shrink down the purchase banners. I like how there is a blank spot to remind players that more is coming so it wouldn’t be a good idea to drop your subscription like we saw many do once the Harbinger of Destruction was rewarded. Players who earn or purchase these items get to keep them even if they unsubscribe.

With the weekly installations of 50 reward points plus this monthly renewal, the total number of reward points per $24.97 spent on the subscription is 250.

The ability to purchase a pack of 50 Attack/Defense/Energy/Stamina Points for 50 reward points once a week is a good one. Unfortunately you don’t get to pick every week and the package is one skill set. For this week it’s defense. This is a good deal because it’s a 1:1 ratio of skill points/reward points and it’s equivalent to 2X Property Builds. The ‘pack’ is referred to as the Emerald Edge and can be found under the VIP tab in the Marketplace and on the bundle popup for the weekly rewards.


Once purchased, the purchase buttons disappear and you will have to wait until the next one is offered.
Energy Refills are available for 30% off and will cost 7 reward points each. This offer is on for all players during Marketplace Promotions and like the 20% off loot items for the Titanium tier it will most likely always be off the original cost and it won’t be any cheaper if there is another discount. Although the benefit says ‘in the Marketplace’, Energy Refills purchased the convenient way while doing jobs will also be 7 reward points. Unfortunately the partial Energy Refills are not discounted.



Getting 2 free Kamikazes a day is cool. All you need to do is play in 1 Arena and they will show up with the rewards.

Additional Job Mastery per click could come in handy for the high energy jobs if we see a new destination but it also applies to Secret District and any unmastered jobs. Fortunately there was a pay to play Secret District added today so we can see what this is all about.

The 5th job in the Barbershop Quartet Secret District pays out 8% mastery per click [1]. Clicking it without any 2X Mastery Boosts or with the Strategist Crew Bonus activated, I got 9% mastery. You only get 1% extra per click but it could add up. 

With the Strategist Bonus active, I got 18% mastery so the extra mastery pays out double and I got 2% more than I would have.
Throwing in a 2X Mastery Boosts while the Strategist is active pays out 27% which is 3% more than without the benefit. Zynga made it quite clear that there will be additional tiers along with surprise rewards in the future. If you don’t like these these new benefits and want to unsubscribe, there could be something better. When tiers were added to the VIP Membership Program we never thought the game would be around long enough to make it to the Titanium tier and once subscribers got there and started dropping, the Emerald tier was created. Emerald doesn’t sound like it should be better than Titanium so it will be interesting to see what the next one is going to be called. I still like Plutonium as we suggested once it became apparent they were going to need to add more levels.